Close up of mysterious light spots on Ceres asteroids

The US Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has released a clear picture of the mysterious light spots on the asteroid Ceres. Science still cannot explain what those mysterious light spots are.

Mysterious light spots on asteroid Ceres

Close up of mysterious light spots on Ceres asteroid - photo 1 Mysterious light spots captured by Dawn at a distance of 4,400 km - (NASA screenshot)

The unmanned space probe Dawn took a photo at a very close distance, about 4,400 km away from Ceres's surface . NASA announced the photo on June 10. The most popular hypothesis at this time is the bright spots that appear due to reflecting light from large ice or salt lakes, even a mineral mine.

The Dawn spacecraft just flew into orbit around the asteroid and will take 15 days to fly all around Ceres. The ship will capture the entire celestial surface to study the history of topography and find out if geological activity is occurring.

Mysterious light spots appear in a volcanic crater about 90 km in diameter. Initially, the scientists only saw two points, but when the image resolved more clearly, many individual spots were found close together.

Dawn space probe ship - (NASA screenshot)

"The strange bright spots make Ceres more unique than any other asteroid that humans have observed in the solar system , " said Dr. Chris Russel, who is in charge of Dawn's exploration mission, said.

There are many theories but Dr. Marc Rayman, Dawn's chief engineer, thinks it's probably salt lakes . They form when seawater evaporates and salts condense.

In early August, Dawn will lower altitude and fly about 1,450 km from Ceres's surface. At that time, scientists could observe the light point more clearly.